by Tina Beckett
She’d go to the grocery store tomorrow and buy a pregnancy test. Not at a nearby store, but one where no one would know who she was. Maybe she’d head up I-75 and venture into Broward County. Wearing sunglasses. And a wig.
“You’re being ridiculous, Cassie.”
But a little voice inside her whispered that she wasn’t being ridiculous. She was being smart.
And Zika?
Her mouth went dry all over again.
Which would be better? Being pregnant? Or having Zika?
Better? Now, there was a word. She couldn’t imagine anything worse, actually.
Unless...
She ran for the basin all over again, nausea gripping her stomach in an iron fist that refused to let go.
There was something worse. Far worse than having one of those two options become a reality.
What if she were pregnant and had Zika?
She sank onto the floor, the cold tile surface giving her a jolt of reality.
What was she going to do?
What else could she do? She was going buy a pregnancy test. And to pray with all she had that the result was negative.
* * *
The buzzer on his desk sounded. “Rafe?”
Carla from the reception desk. She and Stephanie—the other administrative assistant—fielded visitors and calls, funneling the legitimate ones through and deftly dealing with the not so kosher ones.
“Yep.” He pulled up the latest articles on Zika. Sometimes the press was one step ahead of them, so it paid to take a look at what they’d discovered.
“Someone is here to see you.”
He frowned. “Okay. Can you give me an idea who it is?”
“Cassandra Larrobee? I had her take a seat and told her I would call back to see if you were available.” He could practically hear the young woman’s smile over the phone. “So are you? Inquiring minds want to know.”
He ignored the word play, knowing well enough how quickly things could spiral out of control.
Like inviting Cassie to his condo a week ago and then licking strawberry sauce off her body?
What the hell had he been thinking?
He hadn’t. And the results had been...
Dammit!
This was the reason he never invited women to come to his place.
It was time to put this runaway train back on its tracks and send it on its way.
He had no idea why Cassie was here, but it was his chance to cool things down between them. If that was even possible.
“You can send her in. Thanks.”
A minute or two later, there was a quiet knock at the door. “Come in.”
She pushed through the door, and Rafe came out of his chair. Cassie’s face was pale and drawn, with red blotchy areas under her eyes and across her nose. She was carrying a manila envelope in her hand.
He ushered her to one of the two metal seats. “What’s wrong?”
“I wasn’t sure I should come.”
Her face wasn’t the only alarming thing about the neonatologist. Her voice had a shaky quality he didn’t like. He perched on the edge of his desk, foreboding taking hold of him. Was she here to ask why he hadn’t contacted her in the last week? He should have, if only to clarify that their night together had changed nothing between them.
Oh, really?
He sucked down a quick breath, not giving that question time to sink in. Instead, he asked the obvious question. “Is everything okay?”
She didn’t answer for a second, then her lips twisted and she toyed with the edge of the envelope. “No, it’s not. I have something to show you.”
“About the cases?”
“I don’t think so. At least, I hope not. I’ll know soon enough.”
He had no idea what she was talking about. “You’ll know what soon enough?”
“There’s no easy way to say this. And I’m only here because I think you have a...a right...” Her voice faded to nothingness.
A weird pounding began at the base of his skull and traveled quickly toward the front of his head. He stood. “Is what you need to show me in there?”
“Yes.”
He held his hand out, opening and closing his fingers a time or two to indicate she should pass him the envelope, even though the last thing he wanted to do was look inside.
Instead, she just sat there, the item still resting in her lap.
Irritation replaced concern. “What’s this about, Cassie?”
She took a deep breath. “Just so you know, I did not do this on purpose.”
Short of injecting a bunch of her patients with a fatal disease, he couldn’t imagine what she could have done that was so terrible.
“Did you hurt someone?”
“I don’t know. Not yet.”
Okay, he’d had enough. He reached down and took the envelope from her, ignoring her squeak of protest. “Is this confidential information?”
“Yes, yes, it is. You can’t tell anyone.”
“I don’t want you to violate HIPPA laws, Cassie, so unless you’re allowed to share whatever this is with me, then—”
“I’m pregnant.”
His mind had already raced ahead to dire imaginings about contagious diseases, so he had to backtrack through several thousand megabytes of information before the words made sense. “You’re...what?”
Maybe he hadn’t heard her correctly.
“Look inside.” She nodded at the envelope.
Suddenly, Rafe didn’t want anything to do with the item in his hands. If he could have, he would have tossed it back at her with a dismissive laugh...and better yet, tell Carla to send her on her way before she could say anything that would crack his orderly little world more than it already was.
What else could he do, though? Call her a liar? Refuse to look inside the envelope?
Exactly how many times had they had sex? A lot. He couldn’t even set a number to it.
Hell, he was in big trouble.
He lifted the flap on the envelope and let the item slide out of it. A plastic stick. A pregnancy test. He didn’t need to look at the indicator to guess what the result was. The pressure in his head built to dangerous levels.
“Mierda. Santa Madre de Dios,” he whispered. More graphic swearwords rolled past in his head without needing to be vocalized.
No wonder she looked ill. He was feeling a little queasy himself. “Are you sure?”
Her hand touched his. “Yes. I’m sorry, Rafe. I was just as horrified.”
A spot of hope flared inside of him. She’d just broken off a relationship before they were together. Maybe...
“Is it mine?”
As soon as the words left his mouth he knew they were the wrong ones to say. He waited for her to stand to her feet and slap him across the face.
She didn’t, but she did take her hand off his. “I’m not positive but, yes, I think so. It could have only been my ex or...”
Or him. “Have you told him?”
“Yes. I called him this morning.”
It stung that she’d called him first, although he had no idea why. He should feel let off the hook, but there was some other emotion in the spot where relief should be sitting.
“What was his reaction?”
Rafe already had a good idea. He had seen it in her face when she’d come into the bar a month ago. Had figured out the truth about her reason for leaving her ex long before she’d actually told him.
“He said it doesn’t matter. He doesn’t think it’s his and wants nothing to do with it.” She paused and blew out a careful breath, her eyes filling with tears.
He lowered himself into the chair next to hers and wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “Hell, I’m sorry, Cass. What a ro
tten thing for him to say.”
Rafe wasn’t sure he was handling this much better than the ex had, though. Man... He’d never wanted to be a father. Or a husband. Or anything else that required a commitment of more than a few hours once a year.
It was easier that way. No hard goodbyes. He’d already lost his mother and father, and very nearly lost a brother. That was enough for a lifetime.
And yet hadn’t he already played a dangerous game by inviting Cassie into his home and getting a little too close?
She was pregnant. His brain swirled as he tried to find a way through all the chaos clogging his insides and couldn’t seem to find an exit.
Cassie scrubbed a palm across her eyes, leaning into his touch. “It doesn’t matter. Anyway, I didn’t come here to talk about him. I came to ask a question.”
He tensed, his insides turning to ice. He couldn’t marry her, if that’s what she was thinking. Or was she going to ask him to set up a college fund? Take a paternity test? Go on father/son camping trips? Hell, he didn’t want to have to do any of those things. With a mouth that had gone completely dry, he asked, “What’s the question?”
“I want your opinion on the Zika virus. I know you’ve been investigating it, and so...” She ended the words on a shrug.
Zika? What did that have to do with anything? “I don’t understand.”
“I’m trying to get a handle on what I’m facing. Whether or not there’s a possibility that I could have it.”
Realization dawned, and his dry mouth suddenly flooded with saliva. She was pregnant. If she had Zika... His head refused to cooperate. “I don’t think so, unless you’ve exchanged fluids or...”
She nodded as if knowing what he thinking. “My ex has admitted to having...” there was a long pause “...several partners over the last couple of months. But that wasn’t what I was thinking. I just meant in general. Is there any chance I could have contracted it? From a mosquito or a patient?”
“It’s possible. But not likely, given what we know. Most of the people who contracted it got it from somewhere else. There’s a new test that’s just been rolled out, though.”
“I know, and I plan on taking it. But I thought I should warn you as well.”
“Of what?”
“We both know it can be sexually transmitted. I got pregnant, so either a condom failed or we weren’t careful enough.” She paused. “You should probably be tested for the virus as well.”
What the hell?
She’d just handed him an atomic bomb when she’d told him she was pregnant, and she was worried about him? His gut tightened painfully, as did the arm he still had draped over her shoulder.
“I’ll be fine.” Even as he said the words he wondered if they were true. And that thought had nothing to do with Zika.
“I’m so sorry, Rafe.” She twisted to look up at him. “Like I said, I have no intention of doing anything that would affect your life.”
She wasn’t alone in this. If this baby was indeed his, then he’d done far more to affect her life than she’d done to affect his. No matter how or why, he’d had a part in this.
Well, hell. He wished he could say her pregnancy was impossible, but he couldn’t. He’d broken rules he’d never broken before with Cassie, and he had to take responsibility for that.
He swallowed hard. “We used protection, but I didn’t always withdraw as quickly as I should have. I’m the one who should be sorry. How can I make this right?”
“You can’t.” Her eyes shifted away from his before coming back. “I mean, I don’t expect you to do anything. It’s no one’s fault.”
He clenched his jaw, his system threatening to shut down completely. “What do you want to do?”
“I don’t know. I want to see what the Zika test says first.”
The thought of her terminating a perfectly healthy fetus made his insides twist even further. But he had no right to tell her what to do. He wouldn’t...couldn’t make that kind of decision for her. Or anyone. Not after his father. He took his arm from around her, putting subtle space between them.
“If you decide to continue with the pregnancy, the current Zika recommendation is to have two ultrasounds at different times.”
“Continue?” She blinked, her chin firming. “I want to keep this baby, if at all possible. I’m not making any more impulsive decisions.”
Impulsive. Like sleeping with him on the heels of her fiancé’s betrayal? Like him picking up women at a bar year after year to forget about his father’s death?
Rafe didn’t like to think of his actions causing another person harm. Or creating an unplanned pregnancy.
“How long have you known?”
“My periods have never been regular, so it only crossed my mind when I got nauseous yesterday.”
The enormity of it hit him. He may have unknowingly fathered a child. Hell. She wasn’t the only one who felt nauseous. He forced himself to touch her hand again, when all he wanted to do was get up and walk out of the building. “Are you okay?”
“Not really.” She sucked in a breath and blew it back out. “Are you?”
“This wasn’t really what I expected to hear when I came to work today.”
“I was hoping I was wrong about the whole thing.”
“But you weren’t. I’ll take a paternity test if you want. And help financially, of course, if the baby is mine.”
She frowned at him, before standing to her feet. “No need. I’m quite capable of raising a child on my own. Women do it all the time.”
And just like that Rafe was left feeling impotent, like nothing he said or did would change the outcome. Like his father’s massive brain bleed when he’d been left with very little in the way of brain activity, just the systems that operated his heart, but as far as higher thinking? All gone. In medical terms, his father had been brain dead. And there had been nothing anyone could do to change that.
He stood as well. “Women might do this alone all the time, but you don’t have to. I’m willing to help. Want to help.”
As long as she didn’t expect to get married.
Her eyes came up and met his. “Why would you want to? Wouldn’t it be easier just to walk away and pretend this never happened?”
Before he could answer, she got a funny look on her face, her hand going to her stomach. “Trashcan. Quick.”
He’d barely comprehended what the words meant when Cassie took matters into her own hands, rushing behind his desk, picking up the stainless-steel bin and promptly throwing up into it.
* * *
“I’m so sorry.” Cassie was pretty sure that was the fifth time she’d said those words as Rafe had knelt beside her, rubbing her back as she’d thrown up again and again until there was nothing left in her stomach.
His touch was been oddly comforting, and it was scary and thrilling all at the same time. If her engagement had gone the way it was supposed to, it might have been Darrin helping her as she lost everything she’d eaten this morning.
Except she couldn’t picture her ex getting anywhere near her at a time like this.
You’re just being all sour grapes because of what he did.
No. Cassie was pretty sure she wasn’t. She’d loved Darrin.
Or had she?
“No need to be sorry.”
“I’ll clean your trashcan.” The thought made her stomach heave all over again.
“I’ll take care of it.” Rafe left the room again, and she thought he had gone to find one of the janitorial staff to come and deal with it. Raw humiliation crawled up her throat. The fewer people who knew she was pregnant, the better. At least until she’d gotten over the shock of it herself.
She would have to tell Bonnie.
And her parents.
Scratch her parents. She hadn’t ev
en told them about her breakup yet. Besides, they would be all excited about becoming grandparents, and if there was a chance this baby could be affected by Zika, it was better that she kept the news to herself for a little while. Her vision suddenly went blurry as she tried to block out that picture.
She sank back into her chair, the trashcan still between her feet, just in case.
Rafe came back into the room with a wad of wet paper towels. “I don’t have a sofa, or I’d have you lie down. But maybe if you put these on your forehead, it’ll help ease the nausea.”
He pressed the cold cloths to her head, and Cassie closed her eyes with a moan. He was right. It felt heavenly. Lying down sounded even more so. The last thing she wanted to do was to have to drive back home. “Do you mind if I lie on the floor for a minute or two?”
“That bad, huh?”
“I’m hoping the worst is over.”
He helped her onto the carpet and draped the paper towels over her forehead, while he left the room with the trashcan.
She didn’t mean for him to have to clean up her mess and yet she’d just handed him a whole pile of it, and none of it was in that trashcan.
That hadn’t been her intention in coming here, though. She’d wanted to alert him of the risks. She believed in full disclosure.
Her lips twisted. Throwing up in front of him might have been carrying that motto a little too far.
She pulled the hair tie from the back of her head to make it more comfortable. Then she closed her eyes and relished the cool cloth and the temporary relief from the bout of nausea. Finally. At least for now.
A minute or two later Rafe was back. He held up the can with a questioning look.
“I think I’m okay. Thank you. I’ll get up in just a minute.”
“Take your time. When you’re ready, I’ll take you home.”
She laid a hand on the cloth on her head. “My car is here.”
“Let me worry about your vehicle. I want to make sure you get home safely.”
Up went her brows. “I made it here, didn’t I?”
“Maybe, but it’s been touch and go ever since you arrived. I’d rather you not put anyone else at risk.”
Like the baby? No, of course not. He was talking about other drivers.
